The formation of aerogels, in general, involves two major steps, the first is the formation of a sol-gel like material, and the second is drying of the sol-gel like material to form the aerogel. In the past, the sol-gel like materials were made by an aqueous condensation of sodium silicate, or a similar material. While this process works relatively well, the reaction forms salts within the gel that need to be removed by an expensive ion exchange technology, and repetitive washing, thereby rendering this process time consuming, expensive, and laborious. With the recent development of sol-gel chemistry over the last few decades, a vast majority of silica aerogels prepared today utilize silicon alkoxide precursors. The most common of these are tetramethyl orthosilicate (tetramethoxysilane (TMOS) Si(OCH3)4), and tetraethyl orthosilicate (tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) Si(OCH2CH3)4). However, many other alkoxides, containing various organic functional groups, can be used to impart different properties to the gel. Alkoxide-based sol-gel chemistry avoids the formation of undesirable salt byproducts and allows a much greater degree of control over the final product. The balanced chemical equation for the formation of a silica gel from TEOS, by a standard methods is:Si(OCH2CH3)4(I)+2H2O(I)→SiO2(s)+4HOCH2CH3(I)